Asking Why in Czech

Learn how to ask "Why?"

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Lesson Transcript

Ahoj, já jsem Veronika. Hi everybody! I am Veronika.

Welcome to CzechClass101.com’s “Česky za 3 minuty”. The fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Czech.

In the last lesson, you learned how to ask "Who" questions in Czech.

This time, you are going to ask questions with the interrogative word "Why?"

Imagine your boss is giving you a call because you are not at work today... He will certainly ask you Proč dnes nejste v kanceláři?

[slowly] Proč dnes nejste v kanceláři?

So let’s break down this question.

First we had-

Proč, which is the basic translation of "Why" in Czech.

Dnes means “today”.

Nejste is the negative 2nd person plural of the verb být, it is a formal way to say “you are not” in Czech.

And finally v kanceláři which is "at the office"

All together it is

Proč dnes nejste v kanceláři?

So in Czech, proč is the exact translation of "Why", used to ask the reason for something.

So for example, if your boss is asking you "Why are you too late today?" he will say Proč dnes jdete pozdě?

Here, he uses "Why" in order to get explanations and reasons.

Note that here, the form is formal as we used the 2nd person plural verb jdete, the infinitive of which is jít or “to go” in English.

Now it’s time for Veronika’s Insights.

A famous expression in Czech is

Proč ne? which means, like in English, "Why not?"

You can use it to accept a proposition if you agree but are not really keen to do it. Or, if it was not planned in advance.

For example if a friend asks you suddenly "How about we go to the cinema tonight?"

You can answer Proč ne? meaning "Why not?"

Before ending this lesson, let’s review all the ways to translate "Why" in Czech:

- Proč is the basic translation of "Why," as in Proč jdete pozdě? meaning "Why are you late?"

- Finally, Proč ne? is "Why not?"

This lesson is the last lesson of this Absolute Beginner’s video series.

But it’s hopefully not the last you learn about the Czech language! To take your language ability to the next level, check out CzechClass101.com, the fastest, easiest, and most fun way to learn Czech.

Ahoj!!!

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